My Housemate invented a thing called "Big Paper." Well, obviously there was big paper before my Housemate came along. But when we talk about Big Paper we talk about "doing Big Paper" or having a "Big Paper session." Big Paper is a way we figure things out. It's how we identify blocks and sort out our options and begin to see what we want to do about something. We did Big Paper yesterday and it was, as usual, surprising and helpful and powerful.
To do Big Paper you need two people. You need big paper -- poster size, or a great big sheet of newsprint. You need a pen and some colored pencils or markers. The person with the problem talks, and the other person draws and writes on the big paper. The second person asks questions but does not contribute ideas. If you are the scribe during Big Paper, your job is to get clear what the person with the problem feels and thinks.
Big Paper is important because a lot of blurts and unrelated ideas are going to come out. On a big sheet of paper there's room to make separate lists or to put questions that seem important but aren't directly related to the conversational thread you're on right now. You can stick them over in a corner of the page and circle them in pink crayon and get back to them later. Yesterday I had asked Housemate to describe what wild professional success would look like in her life, and she was telling me the attributes of the ideal work situation. She mentioned collaboration and the concept of working collaboratively. That spun off an arrow pointing to another section on the big paper on which we listed all of the kinds of collaboration she does in her life now, informal and formal, and distinguished with color and stars the good kinds of collaboration and those that feel stunted and forced. We could go back and forth between the vision of wild success and the attributes of current collaborations in her life easily, without moving the paper or running out of room in either section.
The job of a Big Paper scribe is tricky. You need to ask questions to tease out the assumptions in your friend's statements. (e.g. "why do you want to stay in this job?" "I think it's the only one I can get." Obviously, absurd. But you write down, "I feel like this is the only job I can get." And then you ask, "how come you feel like you couldn't get a different job?" And you write down the answer. What comes up will be irrational and outdated, fears and invisible blocks. Your friend will roll her eyes after she says some of them, because they're silly. That's the point. We all end up blocked by imagined barriers, and sometimes we can't even see them. Big Paper helps.
We do Big Paper for one another a few times a year, and we have friends who come over for Big Paper when they're overwhelmed or confused. It's really useful.
This is exactly what the "Option Institute" is all about, only they do dialogues without big paper, with one person the explorer, and one asking questions. What you call "teasing out assumptions" they call revealing beliefs. It's a process to look at your beliefs and get rid of the ones that are no longer serving you.
I like the big paper as an added tool. And the colors. People should pay money for this.
Posted by: ML | May 18, 2005 at 09:11 PM